IF WISHES WERE HORSES
IN HONOUR OF THE HORSES’ BIRTHDAY, WE VISIT BREEDER CATRIONA MURPHY ON HER STUD IN THE HUNTER VALLEY.
We talk to Catriona Murphy of Sledmere Stud about her family’s long association with horse breeding, and how she and husband Royston — plus their two sons — have built up their business.
RESPECTED HORSE BREEDER Catriona Murphy, 40, also known as Treen, was born into not just one, but two horse-loving families. In 1920, her great-grandfather Guy Raymond co-founded Sledmere Stud on 360 hectares near Scone in NSW’S Hunter Valley. While this is home for Treen, husband Royston, 46, and their sons, Jack, 11, and Ted, seven, the family has another racing connection — Treen is also descended from the original owners of historic horse stud St Albans near Geelong, Victoria.
“This was on my mum Jennifer Mackay’s side, and they were all racing and breeding people,” says Treen. “Mum is known as a very good breeder and produces a lot of winners. Many of her mares foal here and they are all sold today under our family banner STA, which stands for St Albans Stud.”
It was to St Albans that the famed Phar Lap was spirited into hiding after an attempt on his life in 1930, four days before the Melbourne Cup that he went on to win. “My greataunt, Ann Raymond, was there at the time, and her older brother Michael sat on Phar Lap while he was in hiding. They talked about that all the time when we were growing up.”
Ann was a trailblazer for women in the industry. She managed St Albans, breeding Melbourne Cup, Caulfield Cup and Cox Plate winners. In 1977 she sold St Albans and repurchased Sledmere, which had passed from the family’s ownership. She moved to Sledmere as the Hunter Valley gained prominence, bringing her stud banner and historic mementoes such as trees and even stable bricks with her.
“I grew up not far away at Cangon Stud Farm, Dungog, which has been in our family on my father’s side since 1838 and is where Mum and my brother, Jock, still live today,” shares Treen. “My dad, Jaime, passed away in 2013, but he and Mum bred, reared and raced their own thoroughbreds.”
Treen came to work for Ann officially in 2010. Six years before that she’d met Royston, then long-time manager of Segenhoe Stud, 20 clicks down the road. From County Kildare, Ireland, Royston had been well schooled as a child in horse husbandry. The couple married in 2008, and five years later were given the ultimate gift by Ann, who bequeathed Sledmere to Treen upon her death, aged 88. This season the couple looked after 350 mares, theirs and clients’, and saw 200 foals born, 100 of which will be offered at yearling sales.
“We bring the mares in, get them in foal, foal them down, then take the foals to the yearling sales,” says Treen. Their goal is always to breed horses that will achieve racing success for their clients: buyers, trainers and owners all looking for that next Group One winner. “It’s a long, intensive process,” agrees Royston. “To watch their progress and for them to be successful is a great achievement for everyone involved.”
TREEN “My grandparents died when I was young, so Ann was a grandmother figure to me. She never married or had children, and she lived here at Sledmere with about 40 mares for nearly 40 years.
“I was very close to Ann from an early age and spent a lot of my childhood here. She was a character and she was tough. Only her immediate family called her Ann; everyone else called her Miss Raymond, and she liked it like that. She had the idea that these farms don’t need men, that the majority of work can be done by women, and she proved it.
“In the last years of her life I was here a lot working, and I think we had the same vision of doing it our own way. I met Royston when I went to help out at Segenhoe. I’m not sure it was in my plan to marry an Irishman, but Ann and my parents had the highest respect for him, so it was nice to get the tick of approval from people you admire and look up to.
“We took over the running of the business in 2014. Ann had always run a tidy property. She was old school and liked traditional ways like hand mixing the feed, always adding apple cider vinegar, herbs and garlic. The smell of it would waft around the feed room and follow you everywhere. But the farm was not set up to handle the larger numbers of horses we knew we had to have if we were to create a top nursery stud, and we had to play catch-up with the rest of the industry.
“Royston set up Segenhoe from scratch and he is very clever when it comes to design and vision, so he could see the improvements we needed to make. Because I’m so attached to this place, I struggled with sentimentality. With silly old sheds in the middle of paddocks, I’d say, ‘Why can’t you go around?’ But within five years, we’ve made big improvements to move the horses efficiently.
“Roy and I complement each other and have the same opinion of a horse and its potential. Our life is pretty intense with long hours, but to us it’s not work — it’s a lifestyle and we love it. Jack and Ted love it, too. They are pretty hands-on, and this is about them now, for their future.” >
ROYSTON “I met Ann before I met Treen. Ann used to bring her mares to Segenhoe to get covered [by a stallion] and she looked like this little frail woman, but she was as sharp as a tack. When Treen took over the farm, Ann liked that she had a person in there getting it going. All of sudden Treen had more clients, it was starting to grow and we were selling well.
“Treen and I have different roles. I take care of the breeding side, the broodmares and the foals, and Treen runs all the young stock and looks after the yearlings and getting them to the sales. But we are very much on the same page. We always go to the sales together, and we judge a young horse on what we think it can turn into. We share a great love of horses. Working here, you couldn’t be with someone who doesn’t share your interest.
“The drought has been tough and we’ve been feeding close to 500 horses a day. The good thing with horses is that there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel, because the industry is not really affected by the drought, but in terms of workload it’s been hard. When we started out and made the improvements here, people thought, ‘Well they’re having a go’ and the thing that probably helped us is that so many people know Treen and respect her family. We’ve had unbelievable support, and from some big players. Last year we were named fifth-best-performing stud in Australia in terms of the number of yearlings sold (79 for $13 million), and for a little farm that was a huge result.
“Both our boys are interested in the horses. They have their own animals to feed and be responsible for, like chooks, ducks and sheep — although having said that, there’s only one person on this farm who loves chasing geese and wants to keep them. Two boys, 22 staff and me would happily see the back of them, but what the boss lady likes … the boss lady gets!”
“We are very much on the same page. We always go to the sales together, and judge a young horse on what we think it can turn into.”